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Network of eight radio telescopes around the world records revolutionary image.

Astronomers have captured the first image of a black hole, heralding a revolution in our understanding of the universe’s most enigmatic objects.

The picture shows a halo of dust and gas, tracing the outline of a colossal black hole, at the heart of the Messier 87 galaxy, 55m light years from Earth.

The black hole itself – a cosmic trapdoor from which neither light nor matter can escape – is unseeable. But the latest observations take astronomers right to its threshold for the first time, illuminating the event horizon beyond which all known physical laws collapse.

The breakthrough image was captured by the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT), a network of eight radio telescopes spanning locations from Antarctica to Spain and Chile, in an effort involving more than 200 scientists.

Sheperd Doeleman, EHT director and Harvard University senior research fellow said: “Black holes are the most mysterious objects in the universe. We have seen what we thought was unseeable. We have taken a picture of a black hole.”

France Córdova, director of the US National Science Foundation and an astrophysicist, said that the image, which she had only seen as it was unveiled at the press briefing she was chairing, had brought tears to her eyes. “We have been studying black holes for so long that sometimes it’s easy to forget that none of us has seen one,” she said. “This will leave an imprint on people’s memories.”Story Continues

Maybe some day in the future we can send something (or somebody) to the crash site and see if any of them are still alive and if so how well they have adapted.

The Water Bears were shipped in a kind of suspended animation.
No telling if the crash "released" them or not.
But even if not, it would be very informative to see if they can be revived after exposure to such extreme conditions.

The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but
progress. -- Joseph JoubertAttachment 1008

I wonder why such a large black hole can't be explained by multiple black holes condensing/merging?
.Giant black hole 'should not even exist,' stunned scientists say.
By James Rogers.

Stellar black holes are formed by the collapse of massive stars. The mass of an individual stellar black hole in our galaxy has long been estimated to be no more than 20 times that of the Sun, according to researchers.

Now, however, an international team of scientists led by Prof. Liu Jifeng of the National Astronomical Observatory of China of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (NAOC), has discovered a monster stellar black hole with a mass 70 times greater than the Sun.

"Black holes of such mass should not even exist in our Galaxy, according to most of the current models of stellar evolution," said Prof. Liu, in a statement.
"We thought that very massive stars with the chemical composition typical of our Galaxy must shed most of their gas in powerful stellar winds, as they approach the end of their life,” Liu added. “Therefore, they should not leave behind such a massive remnant. LB-1 is twice as massive as what we thought possible. Now theorists will have to take up the challenge of explaining its formation."Story Continues
.

The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but
progress. -- Joseph JoubertAttachment 1008